Mango reported the highest revenue in its 40-year history for the first six months of the year – more than 1.543 billion euros, a 6.3% increase over the previous year – despite inflation and world politics.
Mango said its collections and value propositions – the brand is based in and designed in Barcelona – are finding favor with customers both in its home market of Spain and other international markets, including the U.S.
Spain, France, Turkey, Germany and the U.S. had the highest revenue figures during the first half of the year. The retailer has been making a continued push to open stores across the U.S., with units in Texas, Georgia, California and Florida.
The fashion retailer’s expansion plans include 57 net store openings in the first half of the year, to reach a store network of 2,743 stores in more than 115 markets worldwide. The goal is to exceed 2,800 units by the end of 2024. The online segment increased revenue and represents nearly 33% of total revenue.
Mango Man grew 21%, and Mango Kids and Teen, 11%. Mango Woman remains the driving force behind the group’s business, accounting for more than 79% of the company’s total revenue.
For Mango Teen, the company created its first campaign entirely using Artificial Intelligence for its limited edition Sunset Dream collection, part of its youth line.
“The campaign consists of a visual with a model and outdoors sunset-themed background for each of the more than 10 garments that make up the collection,” said Jordi Álex Moreno, chief technology information officer at Mango. “It’s one of the first campaigns with the use of this technology in the fashion industry and another clear example of Mango’s commitment to innovation.”
Moreno added that the AI-driven approach has provided valuable insights and creative guidance across various aspects [of the campaign], noting that the campaign was realized through the collaboration of several internal teams at Mango, including, Mango Teen’s design, art and styling, dataset and AI model training, and the photography studio, among others.
Mango, which closed a record 2023 financial year with revenue of more than 3.1 billion euros, is immersed in achieving its 4E Strategic Plan, which plans to exceed revenue of 4 billion euros by 2026. To this end, the company will reinforce its differentiated value proposition and will promote an expansion plan that foresees the opening of more than 500 stores over the next three years.
“AI co-assisted in curating visual elements and inspiration and compiling a cohesive mood board that reflected the dreamy, sunset-inspired aesthetic,” Moreno said. “Ultimately, it also generated the images for the campaign. The first step was creating a dataset of images for each outfit in the collection. From this dataset, the AI engineering team trained an artificial intelligence model to generate new images at scale.”
Moreno said the technology is “a copilot to our employees to help them speed up and reduce repetitive tasks, and allow them to be able to spend more time on value-added work.”
The launch is part of the Earn lever of Mango’s Strategic Plan for 2024 to 2026, which aims to create value through technological development, data management and operational excellence.
With a strong commitment to innovation, Mango has developed more than 15 machine learning platforms since 2018 that apply artificial intelligence at different points of its value chain, such as pricing and personalisation, among other areas.
“We have over 15 tools that aid at different points in our value chain, such as pricing or personalization,” Moreno said. “Midas [helps] with the pricing policy on mango.com, and the retail chain. There’s Gaudi for product recommendations to customers, or Iris, a conversation platform present in more than 60 countries and in more than 20 languages to improve customer service.”
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